Jackson Township woman dies in car-train collision

An elderly Jackson Township woman was killed when her car was struck by a train at the Portage Street NW crossing late Friday morning.

Shane Hoover

A woman died Friday morning when a Cuyahoga Valley Scenic Railroad train struck her car at the Portage Street NW crossing.

Wiladine G. VanWert, 85, of Palmer Drive NW, was traveling alone in her gold Honda sedan at the time of the collision. No one on the train was injured.

Based on heavy damage to the driver’s side of the car, and the direction of the train, which was headed south, VanWert was traveling east on Portage when the train hit her car, said Sgt. Leo Shirkey of the Ohio Highway Patrol.

The Honda came to rest next to a former railroad depot at 4202 Portage St. NW and was draped with a white sheet until VanWert’s body was removed.

The crash happened around 11:50 a.m. Traffic was closed at the crossing for more than three hours as authorities investigated.

Jenna-Rebecca Fowler, 27, of Canton, said she was standing outside of the Circle K at the northwest corner of Portage and Whipple Avenue NW when a train whistle caught her attention.

“I kept hearing it blowing and blowing,” she said.

When the train struck the car, she said, it sent the Honda spinning in midair.

“She died on impact,” Fowler said of the driver. “She had to have.”

Two other witnesses to the crash declined to talk about what they saw, saying they had already relived the incident during an interview with police.

The crossing is marked by signal lights and gates, both of which appeared to be intact and working after the crash.

But Fowler said the safety equipment wasn’t activated before the crash. She also reported that VanWert’s car was traveling west, not east.

Shirkey said authorities had been given various accounts by witnesses on whether the gates and lights were flashing before the crash.

“It’s still being investigated,” he said.

Molly Becker, a spokeswoman for Akron-based Metro Regional Transit Authority, which owns the tracks, said the crossing is maintained every month, and that all was working properly as far as she knew.

Becker said the gates come down 8 to 10 seconds before the train enters the crossing, and the lights flash before that.

The train, comprising four passenger cars with engines at each end, was carrying two passengers and five crew members at the time of the crash, according to Kelly D. Steele, director of marketing and sales for the Cuyahoga Valley Scenic Railroad.

“We certainly are sorry for (the victim’s) family and our concern is with our passengers and the people of the community at this point,” she said at the scene.

The train usually slows to about 15 m.p.h. as it approaches intersections, Steele said. It passes through the Portage crossing four times every day from Wednesday to Sunday.

It was making its second pass through the crossing on Friday, heading from Akron to Canton, at the time of the crash, Steele said.

She also said the train’s engineer reported the signals and gates were working at the time of the crash.

Stark County Coroner P.S. Murthy planned to autopsy VanWert today. Coroner’s investigator Harry Campbell said a preliminary examination showed that VanWert suffered serious injuries in the crash that could have been instantaneously fatal.